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intensity and pace. Just a few years younger than I was, Melissa also felt more like
a peer and an ally than the much younger campaign workers I’d encountered.
She would become someone I trusted—as I do still, to this day—with literally
every part of my life.

Katie McCormick Lelyveld rounded out our little trio by coming on board
as my communications director. Not yet thirty, she’d already worked on a
presidential campaign and also for Hillary Clinton when she was First Lady,
which made her experience doubly relevant. Spunky, intelligent, and always
perfectly dressed, Katie would be in charge of wrangling reporters and TV crews,
making sure our events were well covered and also—thanks to the leather
briefcase she kept packed with stain remover, breath mints, a sewing kit, and an
extra pair of nylons—that I didn’t make a mess of myself as we sprinted between
airplanes and events.

ver the years, I’d seen news coverage of presidential candidates making
their way around Iowa, awkwardly interrupting tables full of unassuming citizens
having coffee at diners, or posing goofily in front of a full-sized cow carved out of
butter or eating fried whatevers-on-a-stick at the state fair. What was meaningful
to voters and what was just grandstanding, though, I wasn’t quite sure.

Barack’s advisers had tried to demystify Iowa for me, explaining that my
mission was primarily to spend time with Democrats in every corner of the state,
addressing small groups, energizing volunteers, and trying to win over leaders in
the community. Iowans, they said, took their role as political trendsetters
seriously. They did their homework on candidates and asked serious policy
questions. Accustomed as they were to months of careful courtship, they were
not likely to be won over with a smile and a handshake, either. Some would hold
out for months, I was told, expecting a face-to-face conversation with every
candidate before finally committing to one. What they didn’t tell me was what
my message in Iowa was supposed to be. I was given no script, no talking points,
no advice. I figured I’d just work it out for myself.

My first solo campaign event took place in early April inside a modest home
in Des Moines. A few dozen people had collected in the living room, sitting on
couches and folding chairs that had been brought in for the occasion, while
others sat cross-legged on the floor. As I scanned the room, preparing to speak,
what I observed probably shouldn’t have surprised me, but it did, at least a little.